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Apple Books Will Be the New iBooks. But Is That Better?

It was announced yesterday that Apple Books is replacing iBooks. Great. Awesome.

Maybe.

For those of us who don't have an iPhone, I doubt it will make much of a difference. In order to use Apple Books, you're still going to need an Apple computer or iPhone. Which...I'm not going to do. Why? Because as soon as I decide I want to try something else, I will lose everything like I did when I decided to move away from the iPod. All that amazing music. Lost.

Unlike Kindle and even Nook, the iBooks app isn't available for anything other than Apple. I searched. I can't download iBooks onto my Windows 10 desktop or onto my Google Pixel 2. So, whenever I upload a book into Draft 2 Digital, I have to go through iTunes to find it. Now, you can find it that way. You really can. It's painful and it hurts, but you can find your book eventually on iTunes to see if it looks right. But iTunes is set up for audio, not books, and that's obvious from the get-go.

Now, the real issue that I'm hoping they're working to fix is the Author to Apple Books relationship. As an author who has yet to successfully make it through the iBooks gates to be able to upload books myself, I can tell you that it's frustrating as Hell! I've wasted countless hours I will never get back just trying to get in the darned door to sell my books and to help them take a portion of my meager income.

Now, the obvious upside to their "Portal of Hell--I mean--iBooks" approach is that there are fewer scammers hitting iTunes. However, there are still authors who have their books stolen and uploaded directly to iTunes. How do we know that? Because Amazon finds them and then suspends the rightful author's account. #Winning

So, the question I have is whether or not Apple Books will help authors find an Amazon safe-zone to launch books to?

That I don't know. What I do know is that Apple Books is supposed to give readers a better reading experience and easier access to Audiobooks.

To fewer books because fewer authors are able to get in.

But that doesn't matter because they'll have access to the traditionally published books and the higher quality indie books written by authors who can actually figure out how to get through the Portal of Hell to sell their books.

So, will Apple Books be the savior I'm hoping it'll be, ushering a new era for the indie author? A place where they won't have to fear losing their job because some amazing pirate stole their book? Or because some troll decided to pick Random Author B out of a hat because they dared comment with the wrong opinion on the right post?

I'm guessing probably not. I don't think it's even on Apple's radar. But I could be wrong. It's happened before. And if anyone could give Amazon a run for their money, it would probably be Apple. Unless someone decides to do something amazing, Amazon is the monopoly and they will continue to make the rules because no one is willing to step into the same arena with them.

It would be nice, though, if Apple would take this moment to look at the indie market and decide to invest in it. I think Amazon has proven that indies are a six-figure bet.